The infamous tunic slot (layer 22).

[Turnabout]

Yeah there are some layers that wouldn't look right with stuff under them, parts of the clothing below would be sticking out, and so the game is coded so that it just completely hides the items that are below. This works with a well-coordinated collection of items where the graphics artists followed some guidelines. But with the collections of graphics we added later on, things sometimes get weird. Or maybe it's that some items are hardcoded (by their ItemID) to hide things, I forgot how exactly this works and for which items and for which layers.

Before relayers were a deed, a player would occasionally ask if we can skew the rules a bit and after a while and over the years there were a few interesting "workarounds" I'd like to make that exceptional relayering possible again someday.

Oh, about this specific issue with the tunic hiding your stuff below, I tested and it seems to not hide it. But I don't know if I understand everything right.
dreadnought with tunic.png

This specific tunic in your picture uses the sash slot (layer 17), then if you equip some item in the layer 22 the dreadnought gear will be covered... at least for me, this thing of slot interaction is somewhat confusing. Maybe I'm doing something wrong. Anyway what I can do to look like in the paperdoll of my first post is to go around without the layer 22 equipped, but I have a titan hammer on that slot .

[Wil]

this thing of slot interaction is somewhat confusing.

The UO client software understands that items of particular types can be placed on particular slots on the paper doll. If you try to place the item there and something else is already in that slot, it will reject you without first asking the server if it's okay. If the slot is empty, the client will tell the server that you tried to put item so-and-so in slot such-and-such. The server will then respond: that item is now in other-slot.

It gets messy because the client's idea of what's allowed in which slot is different from the server's idea of what's allowed in which slot. The client will do what the server tells it to, even if it doesn't make sense to the client. But if the user tells the client to do something that doesn't make sense to the client, the client won't ask the server if it's okay, it'll just say no.

Make sense?

There are ways to work around this in the server software. For example, you could accept a double-click action on the item, and make the double-click wear the item in the slot the server expects (ejecting whatever is there now). That's more or less how the Halloween costumes work. However, drag and drop to the paper doll would still not work right.

-Wil

[Eremite]

Pretty much what Wil said - the client has built in error-checking before it'll send a request to equip to the server. Seems to be based on the ItemID rather than the actual layer property, so if you have something in layer X equipped, but then try to equip something that is *normally* in layer X, the client gets confused. If you equip the re-layered one first, then drag the X-layered one, it doesn't see an ID equipped that would normally be in layer X so it is happy.

It'd be a nightmare to code up a system that the end user could use to handle changing equippable layers, but you can get some fun effects. This was my old look from playin' around with re-layers:

[Turnabout]

It gets messy because the client's idea of what's allowed in which slot is different from the server's idea of what's allowed in which slot. The client will do what the server tells it to, even if it doesn't make sense to the client. But if the user tells the client to do something that doesn't make sense to the client, the client won't ask the server if it's okay, it'll just say no.

Make sense?

Yes. Thank you Wil for the explanation.

[Wil]

Seems to be based on the ItemID rather than the actual layer property

I'm not so sure about that part. A few years back the client was modified with some "puppet" graphics which the client understands to fit in the 2H slot. I'd be interested in how that was done.

[Cerrera]

Today just tried out, changed graphics of hakama shita, and it was hiding armor ,shirt under it stayed visible.